Meet 'The Twelve' author Justin Cronin

PORTSMOUTH — RiverRun Bookstore welcomes author Justin Cronin back to the store to read from and sign his new book, The Twelve, on Thursday, Oct. 18 at 7 p.m.

About the author:

Cronin is The New York Times bestselling author of The Passage, Mary and O'Neil (which won the PEN/Hemingway Award and the Stephen Crane Prize), and The Summer Guest. Other honors for his writing include a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and a Whiting Writer's Award. He lives with his family in Houston, Texas.

About the book:

In his internationally bestselling and critically acclaimed novel The Passage, Justin Cronin constructed an unforgettable world transformed by a government experiment gone horribly wrong.

With The Twelve, the story continues.

In the present day: As a man-made apocalypse unfolds, three strangers navigate the chaos, desperate to find others, to survive, to

witness the dawn on the other side of disaster. Lila, a doctor and an expectant mother, has been so broken by the spread of violence and infection that she continues to plan for her child's arrival even as society dissolves around her. Kittridge, known to the world as "Last Stand in Denver," has been forced by loss of electrical power to flee his stronghold and is now on the road, dodging the infected, armed but alone and well aware that a tank of gas will get him only so far. April is a teenager fighting to guide her little brother safely through a minefield of death and ruin. These three will learn that they have not been fully abandoned — and that in connection lies hope, even on the darkest of nights.

A hundred years in the future: Amy, Peter, Alicia, and the others introduced in The Passage work with a cast of new characters to hunt the original twelve virals ¿ unaware that the rules of the game have changed, and that one of them will have to sacrifice everything to bring the Twelve down.

The scope widens and the intensity deepens as the epic tale of sacrifice and survival begun in The Passage surges forward in its breathtaking sequel — The Twelve.

RiverRun Bookstore is located at 142 Fleet St. in downtown Portsmouth. NH. The store hosts more than 150 events each year. For details, call 603-431-2100 or visit www.riverrunbookstore.com.